EMF News

The CELAN project investigates the language needs of businesses and provides solutions to language strategies. The Round Table is geared at businesses, business representative organisations, language service and technology providers, training institutions, etc. It will discuss where market meets training and what should be done in the future to improve competitiveness and employability through language strategies.
The Round Table is followed by the meeting of the Business Platform for Multilingualism on Tuesday, 31 January morning. For more information, have a look at the programme.

Download the draft programme
See the list of speakers

In the following video made in the context of the first Round table of the ProInterNet (PIN) project, I. Marinou, director of the Greek Man Power Employment Organization (OAED) in Patras and I. Kostopoulos, ICT consultant in the Municipality of Patras, discuss about the future of Internet related Jobs. They speakers outline their views on future needs and make suggestions about what can be done to improve the situation in the Internet related job market.


EMF is partner of the ProInterNet (PIN) project funded by the LLP programme of the European Comission. PIN aims to improve transparency, information systems and guidance on skills and qualifications for Internet related professions at European Level. As a result of the project the e-Jobs Observatory has been implemented as the one-stop-shop for e-Jobs, e-skills and e-competences in Europe.

The new call for proposal has been published today (18/01/2012) with a deadline of 12th of April 2012, at 17:00.00 Brussels local time. The indicative budget is 291 million euros.

Several objectives of the following Challenges are open: Challenge 2: Cognitive systems and robotics, Challenge 4: Technologies for Digital Content and Languages, Challenge 5: ICT for Health, Ageing Well, Inclusion and Governance, Challenge 8: ICT for Learning and Access to Cultural Resources, Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) and International cooperation -partnership building and support to dialogues-.
For more information:
Download the call fiche
Visit the ICT wiki
Visit the Participants portal

EMF is a partner in a new project (Grenn IT node ) that investigates the needed skills and competences for green ICT jobs. 

The project started in November 2011 and address the shortage of skilled professionals in the Green IT field. During the 24 months of the project, Green IT node  will analyse the market needs, the existing trainings available for the different components and competences, and define a professional standard in the participating European countries. 
GreenIT node will develop European specialist profiles that are in compliance with the principles of the European metaframeworks EQF/e-CF and ECVET as well as guidelines for developing/setting-up further vocational training measures for Green ICT jobs. The expected impact will allow for comparable skills sets for these professions of the future which supports the European labour market and tus, the employability of professionals while at the same time contributing to one of the major challenges of Europe 2020.
Green IT node is funded by Lifelong Learning programme of the European Commission.

More information on the project
More information on eJobs in Europe

The Commission has adopted a Communication presenting 16 targeted initiatives aiming to boost e-commerce from its current levels of 3.4% of total retail sales  to 7% by 2015.
The plan places emphasis on strengthening a single harmonized framework for e-commerce and other commercial online services and proposes an action plan to remove  five main obstacles to the Digital Single Market:
- the supply of legal, cross-border online services is still inadequate;
- there is not enough information for online service operators or protection for internet users;
- payment and delivery systems are still inadequate;
- there are too many cases of abuse and disputes that are difficult to settle;
- insufficient use is made of high-speed communication networks and hi-tech solutions.

The communication was adopted the 11 of January together with the Green Paper on Card, Internet, and Mobile payments.

More information
Download the communication

The European Commission has launched a consultation for a secure and transparent integrated payments environment throughout the EU.The Green Paper assesses the current landscape of card, internet and mobile payments in Europe, identifies the gaps between the current situation and the vision of a fully integrated payments market and the barriers which have created these gaps. The objective of the Green Paper is to launch a broad-scale consultation process with stakeholders to validate or contribute to the Commission’s analysis and to help identify the right way to improve market integration. 
The document includes facts and figures showing how the European citizens shopping and paying way is radically changing: -One in three European citizens used online banking in 2009. Studies indicate that by 2020, two out of three EU citizens may use online banking. -The number of online shoppers in Europe is forecast to increase from 141 to 190 million between 2009 and 2014 with the average spent by each buyer increasing from EUR 500 to EUR 600/year-Around 726 million payment (credit and debit) cards were used in the EU in 2009. This represents an average of almost 1.5 cards per citizen. The average spending per card amounted to more than EUR 2 000/year.
The deadline for submitting contributions to the consultation is 11 April 2012.

Download the consultation

The CIP ICT Committee has recently approved the draft ICT PSP Work Programme 2012. The ICT PSP supports the realisation of European policies and in particular the Digital agenda for Europe and is aligned with its priorities. The programme addresses obstacles hindering further and better use of ICT based products and services and barriers for the development of high growth businesses, notably SMEs, in this field.
In order to optimise the impact of Union support, funding is concentrated on a limited number of themes and objectives. WP 2012 focuses on 5 themes:

– ICT for "smart" cities
– Digital content, open data and creativity
– ICT for health, ageing well and inclusion
– Innovative government and public services
– Trusted eServices and other actions

The 6th ICT PSP Call for Proposal is expected to open from 1 February to 15 May 2012. An information day on Call 6 is foreseen the 3 February 2012. Confirmation of the date, the exact venue and the draft agenda will be published during this week on the ICT PSP website.
Download the draft ICT PSP programme

Please note that the document is still subject to the formal approval by the Commission expected in January 2012.

On November 17, the Council of the European Union issued conclusions on language competences to enhance mobility. In the document the Council not only addresses multilingualism for jobs mobility but also mentions the importance to foster better use of language competences as a mean of increasing the competitiveness of EU business, and especially that of small and medium-sized enterprises. In this context, the Council welcomes the work of the Business Platform for Multilingualism of which EMF is a member of the Steering Committee, and invites the European Commission to further pursue its support and stakeholder initiatives of this kind.

Download the document

The European Commission published yesterday its Communication on Horizon 2020, the new R&I Framework Programme.
Amongst the novelties are:
-Major simplification through a simpler programme architecture;
-Integration of research and innovation by providing seamless and coherent funding from idea to market;
-A strong focus on creating business opportunities out of our response to the major concerns common to people in Europe and beyond, i.e. ‘societal challenges’;
-Focus on SME with a special instrument.
-Sustainable development will be an overarching objective of Horizon 2020.
Information and Communications Technologies in Horizon 2020
The overall aim of EU research and innovation in ICT under Horizon 2020 is to bring the benefits of progress in these technologies to European citizens and businesses. In particular, ICT in Horizon 2020 will support the development of ICT in Science, ICT in industrial leadership and ICT in societal challenges.

For more information:
Read the Communication
Visit the website

The Joint Declaration to strengthen EU-LA cooperation was launched yesterday at the “Fostering EU-Latin America ICT Policy Dialogue” event in Brussels in front of 120+ stakeholders from Latin America and the EU.

The ambitious programme gave an overview of EU-LA initiatives and showcased the steady development of the S&T relations of both regions. EMF presented the network of Project Angels of the Pro-Ideal Plus project. The event closed its first day of work with a discussion on collaboration priorities and instruments that will be part of the Joint Declaration.

Today, in the afternoon, the Joint Declaration will be presented to the Members of the European Parliament in Brussels.
Open publication - Free publishing
The Joint Declaration is based on the results of studies, activities, meetings and discussion brought forward by stakeholders partnered in a number of project initiatives and follows the identification of common challenges, synergies and future opportunities in EU-LAC cooperation in the field of ICT.

The Joint Declaration is an evolving document and all stakeholders active in ICT international cooperation for R&D+i between Europe and Latin America are invited to support and/or give their contributions based on their specific experience and interest.

Support and/or give your contribution to the Declaration

More information

The European Seal of e-Excellence Seeks Innovative Digital Media and ICT Companies for the 10th Anniversary of the Award

• Are you an ICT company at the forefront of technology?
• Do you market your products & services internationally?

Applications are online at www.seal-of-excellence.org. Deadline 31 December 2011.
The winners will be announced at CeBIT, the most prestigious ICT fair in Europe on 6 March 2012.

More info: www.seal-of-excellence.org

The European e-Skills 2011 Conference will be a kick-off for the preparation of the European e-Skills Week, which will be held on 26-30 March 2012. As an initiative of the European Commission, DG Enterprise and Industry, the European e-Skills Week Conference will feature the presentation of the roadmap for the European e-Skills Week campaign in 2012, together with presentations from industry leaders, policy makers and key note speakers from universities and an overview of different national activities.

The conference is organised by the European Commission Directorate-General Enterprise and Industry, in partnership with DIGITALEUROPE, EUN Schoolnet and other leading stakeholders.

More information and registrations

Organized by the FORESTA project funded under the EU’s 7Th Framework Programme to support R&D cooperation between Latin America and Europe in the field of ICT, the conference ‘Fostering EU-Latin America ICT Policy Dialogue’ will take place in Brussels, Belgium, on Monday and Tuesday 28 and 29 November 2011.

The event will be an important forum for European and Latin-American research stakeholders to discuss strategies to intensify cooperation in Information and Communication Technologies. It bring together stakeholders from ICT research, industry and industry federations, decision-makers, European and Latin-American research and innovation funding agencies, as well as SMEs and large companies from each region interested in cooperation with Latin America and with Europe.

‘Fostering EU-Latin America ICT Policy Dialogue’ event will use panels and round tables to elicit the insights of invited experts and inputs from the audience in order to develop strategic recommendations in support of a reinforced EU-LA ICT cooperation. The recommendations will be streamlined into a Joint Declaration that will be presented to representatives of the European Commission, the European Parliament and Latin-American governments in the closing session of the event to be held at the European Parliament.

EMF will actively participate at the event presenting Pro-Ideal and Pro-Ideal Plus projects outcomes, including the success story of the Project Angels Coaching course.

More information

The roundtable "Cyberspace: opportunity and challenge for Languages", will be held in Brussels the 22 November 2011 to disscuss on new opportunities and challenges for Languages in the Cyberspace. The debate will be moderated by Quentin DICKINSON, Director of Radio France for European Affairs in Brussels.

Maragretah Marzura, Secretary General of EMF will participate in the event to share knowledge acquired in the META and CELAN EU projects.

If you are interested please register at: bxl-europe@skynet.be

The roaming charges currently levied by mobile operators within the EU are detrimental to European integration and the competitiveness of the European market - it essentially means that virtual borders remain for communication inside the EU where real borders have become invisible.

“Europeans for Fair Roaming” call for a faster reduction in prices, free receiving of calls when roaming and the extension of consumer protection mechanisms to other countries outside the EU. The initiative considers that price caps for data roaming are still much higher than they should be to allow consumers to use their phones abroad. The proposed price caps (500-900 EUR / gigabyte) are still unduly high considering that the cost for operators to provide one gigabyte of data today is in the region of 1 EUR.

“Europeans for Fair Roaming” already expanded to a network of more than 1500 individuals, 10 MEPs from different political groups and 11 organisations (including big organisations such as JEF and ZDNet) representing/reaching about 125.000 people.

You may find out more and join the initiative here

Organised by the European Commission (Direction General Education and Culture) and the Education, Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency, The Infoday 2012 wants to give useful information on the priorities of the 2012 call and what's new to the programme. The event will also provide practical advice on the preparation and submission of proposals, and on the management of grants.

EMF will activelly take part in this event, looking for new projects opportunities in Session 3.2: Key activity 3 Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and promoting the two running LLP projects on e-Jobs e-Skills and e-Competences in which it participates: www.ejobs-observatory.eu and www.eqf-iserve.eu

More information

In the context of the e-Skills and ICT Professionalism project, CEPIS and the Innovation Value Institute (IVI) have published a synthesis report on "State of play regarding ICT Professionalism and Training Programmes for ICT Managers in Europe”. The objective of the research initiative is to support the development of:

-a European Framework for ICT Professionalism with the goal of enhancing ICT professionalism and mobility across Europe,
-a European Training Programme for ICT managers to promote new competences with a view to better address the challenges of ICT driven innovation and the future Internet.

The European Commission Directorate General Enterprise and Industry launched the project "e-Skills and ICT Professionalism" with the aim of supporting the development of a European Framework for ICT Professionalism, and a European Training Programme for ICT Managers, with the goal of improving ICT professionalism and mobility across Europe. This synthesis report marks the halfway point of pioneering research which is due to be completed in January 2012 and also signifies the end of Phase I of the project.

Download the report

The report synthetices the final results for the study on “Enterprise 2.0 in Europe”, created by Tech4i2, IDC and Headshift for the European Commission.
The document is adressed to 4 main issues:

-WHAT? What is E20, what is new, and what is it good for, concretely?
-WHY? Why does it matter? Does it help reaching EU goals of
sustainable growth?
-HOW? What are the key requirements for a successful
implementation?
-SO WHAT? What are the policy implications? What are the key
challenges, and what policy actions should be taken?

The report addresses the questions above outlined, but as a structured self-consistent and readable report rather than as a list of points. Therefore, the structure of the chapter does not simply reproduce the questions in the same order, but organically addresses them in the course of the narrative.

Download the report

European Commission is organising an Information Day to better support the preparation of proposals for the 9 FP7 Call concerning ICT-2011.4.3 Digital Preservation and 8.2 Access to Cultural Resources. The event will inform about the scope of the call, assist preparing project proposals and facilitate sharing experiences. The information day will give participants the chance to network, to find partners for their projects and get feedback on proposal ideas from officials of the European Commission.

The event will take place on 15 November at the Jean Monnet Conference Centre, Luxembourg.

More information and registrations

The Council of the European Union adopted a new directive the 10th of October to increase the consumer protection in distance (including on-line) and off-premises purchases across the European Union.

The new directive fully harmonises the list of information to be given to consumers and the right of withdrawal for distance and off-premises purchases. Subject to certain exceptions, the consumer will have the right to withdraw from a distance or off-premises contract within a period of fourteen days without giving any reason and without any costs.

Top 10 benefits for consumers in the new Directive:
1) The proposal will eliminate hidden charges and costs on the Internet
2) Increased price transparency
3) Banning pre-ticked boxes on websites
4) 14 Days to change your mind on a purchase
5) Better refund rights
6) Introduction of an EU-wide model withdrawal form
7) Eliminating surcharges for the use of credit cards and hotlines
8) Clearer information on who pays for returning goods
9) Better consumer protection in relation to digital products
10) Common rules for businesses will make it easier for them to trade all over Europe.

More information